Behind Those Eyes
by Katie 452
Summary: A look at the life of Dean Winchester between Sam leaving and the pilot.
1. Packing

Title: Behind Those Eyes

Author: Katie

Summary:A look at the Winchester life between Sam leaving and the pilot.

Spoilers: None really, at least not so far but a general understanding of the show would help

Rating: PG for language

Pairing: None

Authors Note: I hope you like it. Oh, and since I don't have a beta all mistakes are mine.

Distribution: Please! Just let me know.

Feedback: Please!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural. I wish I did though.

**Chapter one: Packing**

A 22 year old Dean Winchester unlocked the front door of his family's most recent apartment. He was uncharacteristically happy. He had received some great news today and was walking down the hallway to his little brother's room to share the news with him.

He did a quick double knock on his brother's door and without waiting for an answer pushed the door open, "Hey, Sammy, you aren't going to believe -" Dean's sentence trailed off as he saw the inside of Sam's room. Everything was gone, the open closet was empty and the bed was stripped.

"Sam?" Dean yelled and turned around to walk back down the short hallway. Just as he reached the small common room the door swung open to reveal John Winchester, Dean's father.

"Sam's leaving" John said simply and Dean felt as if he had been sucker punched. "He's going to California" John added not bothering to hide the bitterness in his voice.

Before Dean could ask anymore question 18 year old Sam Winchester walked though the door and retrieved the lone box that was waiting there for him. As soon as he walked in John started yelling. Sam and John were in a verbal punching match but it went by Dean in a blur. _Sam was what? _Then Dean heard his father's voice, "If you leave. Don't bother coming back" and without another word Sam was out the door.

Without thinking Dean ran out of the room and into the hallway of the rundown apartment complex, "Sammy…" The apartment door slammed itself shut behind Dean. Sam slowly dropped the box from his hands as he turned to face his brother and the box hit the floor with a soft thud.

"So, there's something you should know" Sam said slowly as tears gathered in his eyes.

"You're leaving…obviously" Dean answered, "Where are you going to go?"

"I applied to college, Stanford, I got in. That's where I'm going" Sam answered.

"I didn't even know you were seriously considering that" Dean answered, his eyes glazing over as he put on his poker face. "How could you not tell me you were applying to college?"

"You would havetried to talk me out of it and I couldn't let that happen. Dean, if I don't get out now, I might never" Sam answered.

"Why do you have to get out?" Dean asked, _what's so wrong with me and dad?_ He added in his mind.

"This is your life, not mine" Sam answered, "I never wanted this"

Dean shrugged, he couldn't change his mind, well, he probably could if he really tried but it was clear that Sam wouldn't be happy here and all his life Dean has always tried to make Sammy happy. "Go then" was all that Dean said.

Sam looked like he wanted to say something, but he never did. They held each other's gaze for a long moment before Sam picked his box up from the floor and walked out of the apartment building.

As soon as Dean walked back into the apartment he could hear his dad cursing and throwing things behind his closed room door and Dean knew full well that John thought he couldn't be heard through the door.

Dean walked to his room and slammed the door shut. He pressed play on his boom box and the Metallica CD that was all ready in there started to play so loudly that Dean all most really couldn't hear John in the other room.

Dean crossed the small room and sat on his bed. He buried his face in his hands and finally let his thoughts overcome him.

Sammy left. And, yeah, that sucked, but all in all that wasn't why Dean was mad. Okay, well, it wasn't _most_ of why Dean was mad. Sam, his Sammy was going to college. Stanford, too, and from what Dean knew that was no easy college to get into. And Dean hadn't even known that Sammy had applied, let alone got in and was going. Was he really that bad of a brother that Sammy, who he'd practically raised (and that was no easy feat) didn't even tell him he was getting the hell out of dodge just as soon as he could?

Dean sat straight up and whipped the one tear that had fallen off his cheek when he heard the loud knock on his door. "Yeah"

"We're leaving tomorrow, get packed" Was all his dad said before retreating back to his own room.

It was two months before Dean called Sam. Him and his dad were in some cheep motel outside of Montana and his dad was in the shower. He didn't know if he was relieved or angry when the phone clicked over to voice mail.

"Hey, you've reached Sam Winchester, leave a message or try me at home. Later."

Dean could hear some chick in the background and for a split second he was jealous, sounded like Sammy was getting his normal, so he hesitated before leaving his message, "Hey Sam, its me, just wanted to know if you got to Stanford okay and everything, so I'll talk to you later."

Dean folded his phone shut and threw it across the room to land on top of his coat with a little more force than necessary before laying back on the bed and turning on the TV.

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Feedback is apperiacted and ideas are welcome.


	2. Solo Job

Title: Behind Those Eyes

Author: Katie

Summary: A look at life of Dean Winchester between Sam leaving and the pilot.

Spoilers: None really, at least not so far but a general understanding of the show would help

Ratings: PG for language

Pairing: None

Authors Note: I hope you like it. Oh, and since I don't have a beta all mistakes are mine.

Distribution: Please! Just let me know.

Feedback: Please!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural. I wish I did though.

**Chapter Two: Solo Job**

Dean Winchester was 23 years old when his dad let him take his first solo job.

It was supposed to be easy, an in and out kind of job. Hell – Dean suspected that was the only reason his father had let him go alone.

Dean showed up at the house in question. Kevin something or other greeted him. The past 6 owners of the house had died within 2 years of purchasing the home and normally a hell of a lot faster than that. Why anyone would buy that home was beyond Dean, however the price of the otherwise nice home had been extraordinarily low. Dean remembered that much from the small amount of research he'd actually done.

Dean was posing as someone who was thinking of buying a near by house and was counting on his charming personality to win him a fast friend who would immediately want to share any potentially supernatural encounters with him.

"Can I help you?" Kevin asked when he opened the door.

"Yeah, my name is Kirk Hammett, and I'm thinking about buying the house down the street." Dean said mentally congratulating him self on his fast thinking. Of course, the lead guitarist of a band as big as Metallica was risky, but he lived on the edge.

Kevin had let him into his home and they'd sat and talked. All Dean knew was that so far everything was fine. Kevin has owned the house for six months and so far no flickering lights, no weird scratching, no nothing.

When Dean left it was with the promise that they would go out for drinks sometime in the near future and that if Kirk had anymore questions about the homes/neighborhood he would come see Kevin again. See – charming!

Dean settled into his beloved Impala and headed towards the motel he'd seen on his way in town. He'd never forget when he'd gotten that car. His dad had given it to him when he was 15 and a half. The same day he got his temporary license, and on his 16th birthday, right after Dean got his license John legally signed the car over to him. But that car had been his since he was 2 years old and everyone knew it. The first two words Dean had put together were 'my' and 'car'. And while he was never an overly demanding child he would point at the car and look up at his mom and dad and say "my car" on an almost daily basis. That is, until his mom died, because that's when everything changed, because as far as John (and Dean for that matter) were concerned, that was the day that Dean Winchester became an adult.

When Dean got to the motel he got a room, or rather Kirk Hammett got a room he could pay for daily as he wasn't sure how long he'd be there.

Dean entered the room that was like so many others he'd stayed in with his father and even Sam before he took off. He dropped his stuff at the foot of the bed before pulling his cell phone out of his pocket to call his dad who was working some job in Florida, or at least he thought it was Florida, when John agreed to let Dean go on this job alone he'd been so excited he hadn't paid much attention after that. _Oh well_ he thought entering the numbers and listening to the rings. That was the deal – Dean could take this job as his own but they had to check in with each other at least once a day.

Dean told his dad all about what he found so far and John had immediately suggested more research. _I hate research _Dean thought to himself but instead gave a simple, "Yes, sir"

When all was said and done it was late and Dean was tired so he found so old movie on TV and half heartily watched it wiling sleep to take over.

Dean woke up ridiculously early the next morning and watched TV for a while before getting up and getting ready to go. While he was pulling his shirt over his head he could hear the TV he'd forgotten to turn off switch over to some TV show where a mom was dropping her kid off a college. Taking tons of pictures, and buying a fan and a tiny refrigerator and tons of other things the kid would never use.

For a split second Dean's mind went to Sammy. If Sam would have just told Dean, yeah he would have been angry for a while but he would have gotten over it, would have wanted his little brother to be happy. He would have driven him to Stanford and bought him things he'd never use.

Dean picked up his cell phone and highlighted 'Sammy Cell' and stared at it for a long moment before slamming the phone shut and shoving it in his jacket pocket. No, no he would not call Sam again. Dean had called Sam a total of 7 times since he'd left. The first being only 2 months after he'd gone and the last being on Sam's latest birthday. He'd left short messages on his brother's phone each time and Sam had never once picked up or called him back. He didn't want to be a part of this family anymore - fine. He thought he could just walk away, pretend he was normal - the hell with him.

Dean went to the local library and did all the research he could on the house and legends surrounding it and what he came up with was that the man who had the house built 14 years ago was named Robert Slinger and he had since died. That's it, no details, so basically he had a whole lot of nothing. Until, that is, he asked the cute librarian, Karen, if she had ever heard anything about the home.

"It's this stupid legend…" She started flirting with him with a shy smile. "They say the man who had that house built was murdered there two years after he moved in and that he's so mad that he couldn't live there anymore, he hunts the place, so no one can"

Dean smiled slyly and looked up at Karen, "Do you have any idea where that man is buried?"

"Why?" Karen laughed.

"Curiosity" Dean shrugged.

"Well, curiosity killed the cat" She smiled

"Damn good thing I'm not a cat" Dean smirked. Dean talked to Karen for a little while longer but aside from her phone number didn't get much more information.

Dean drove to the local cemetery and looked all over for the name Robert Slinger. This is insane, Dean thought to himself. He could spend all days at that cemetery and not cover half the ground, and for all Dean knew there were more cemeteries around town. Dean shook his head before leaving the cemetery and going to a local diner. There he met Shawnda. He stared a conversation with her that just happened to veer to the direction of the house. After 20 minutes and 3 cups of coffee Dean figured out that Robert Slingers younger brother lived about an hour away.

Dean drove to the younger brother, Eric's, apartment. He told Eric he was Mark Evans (bassist for AC/DC, but he didn't need to know that) estranged friend of Robert who just recently heard of Robert's death and wanted to pay his long overdue respects.

Eric told him that Robert was buried in a family plot that was part of a small cemetery back in Robert's home town, about 20 miles from the house Robert owned and died in.

When Dean asked Eric about Robert's death he clammed up. Said he was found in his house, dead, long, deep cuts all across his body and when Dean thought back to his preliminary research, that's exactly how all the victims in the home were found.

Dean left Eric's house and drove to the small family plot. It was surrounded, houses on one side, a grocery store and some apartments on another and the rest of the cemetery on the others. Dean really didn't want to have to dig this guy up to salt and burn the bones where there were this many people who could see. "So, we'll call this the back up plan" Dean muttered to himself.

When he left the cemetery he went straight back to the motel and called his dad, "I think I'm figuring this out" Dean said happily into the phone. Their conversation went on, Dean told John about what was happening with him and he asked John what other ways you could stop and angry sprit. John told Dean all he knew of how to purify the house itself and he told Dean of the job he was working. _This is how it's supposed to be_ Dean thought to himself before thoughts of Sammy worked themselves into his head. Dean willed them out and focused on his dad's voice.

"You be careful" Dean's father told him.

"Yes, sir, you too" Dean added, receiving a chuckle from his father before he folded the phone shut and setting it on the nightstand.

When Dean woke up the next morning he waited until 11:00 and then went to Kevin's house. The surprise of seeing Kirk Hammett again was evident on the man's face when he invited Dean back into his home. Dean sat in a chair across from Kevin and took a deep breath while contemplating exactly how to tell this man that he needed to perform an ancient wiccan ritual in his home so he wouldn't die.

"Do you know the history of this house?" Dean asked looking the man in the eye. "The deaths that have happened here?" Dean asked wanting to know exactly how much convincing this was going to take.

The man shrugged his shoulders a bit, "I know people have died here, and I've heard ghost stories, that it's hunted or some such"

"What if they're not just stories, I mean why did you buy this house knowing its history?" Dean asked getting the feeling that something was not quite right.

"I don't believe in ghosts" The man said simply. "Now, I'm sorry to have to cut this short be I'm meeting with some friends in a little while and I really need to get ready." There was a pause, "If you don't have anything to do, you could come with" Kevin added.

Dean nodded his head, "Oh, no thank you" Dean answered. He had the unexplainable feeling that something was not right so instead of going with what he planned and telling the man that his home was haunted Dean left the home and went back to his car.

Dean got into car and drove to an ally. When he got there he went into the trunk of his car and he grabbed everything he thought he might need. Everything his dad told him he needed for the ritual, a gun loaded with rock salt, two knives, some books of information he thought he might need, he strapped a knife to his ankle and shoved a gun in the back of his pants. Hey – better safe than sorry!

Dean left his car in the ally so Kevin wouldn't see it and walked back to the house. He hid outside until Kevin left then snuck inside the house. It took him all most twenty minutes just to get thing set up and he wasn't 5 seconds into the actual ritual when he heard something hard and heavy hit the floor behind him. Dean whirled around to see random things falling from their rightful places to hit the floor with too much force. _This is not going well _Dean thought to himself.

The objects began to swirl around him, too fast for Dean to do anything. Periodically and without warning objects would fly at Dean hitting him, causing deep cuts where the landed and scratched down his body. After a few seconds that felt like hours a laptop computer slammed into Dean with enough force to knock him over. Dean crawled out of the house throwing a quick look over his shoulder hoping absently that Kevin didn't come home.

Dean moved as quickly as he could to the Impala and drove to the cemetery. _Time for the back up plan _Dean grabbed a shovel, rock salt, and lighter fluid from his trunk and slammed it shut hen he remembered all most all the rest of his stuff was currently residing in Kevin's living room.

Dean walked to the grave and being unable to think of a better way to do this shoved his shovel into the hard ground of Robert Slinger's grave. Dean dug as fast as he could but the guy was six feet under and Dean was only one man so even being as late and dark as it was, Dean did attract some unwanted attention. A woman that lived in an old house behind the cemetery and could see him from her window walked out and over to the fence that separated her back yard from the cemetery. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"I'm umm, I work here, at the cemetery, there's just something that we have to check with this casket" Dean said and laughed internally at the cover-up that sounded stupid and unbelievable even to him.

The woman clearly didn't believe him, "Well why are you the only one out here, that's quite a bit of digging for one person"

"We're just a little short staffed at the moment and…" Dean shook his head, "Okay, clearly I don't work here, and I'm not fooling you, but I swear I'm not doing anything wrong"

"Grave robbing is wrong" The woman said harshly.

Dean had to bite back the urge to laugh, _no mama, I'm not grave robbing, I just want to light this guy on fire then I'll be out of your way, _oh yeah, that would go over great. "I'm not robbing him"

"Then what are you doing" The woman asked.

"Nothing" Dean answered, "just…you know…digging"

"Cute" The woman answered clearly not amused.

"I can't tell you what I'm doing but I can tell you that I'm doing it for good reason" Dean offered.

The woman shook her head and walked away. _What was that, did I win? _Dean thought to himself. _Dig fast_ he thought to himself.

About 2 hours later Dean's shovel hit the casket. He pulled it open and threw salt all over the decaying body. Dean's head shot up as he heard something moving around. Upon seeing that his visitors were cops he poured as much lighter fluid on the corpse as he could before slowly and silently stepping out of the grave. He lit his Zippo and threw it into the grave and watched it erupt into flames before running back in the direction of his car.

Dean got back into his car and drove back in the direction on Kevin's house. He sat in the car and looked in the mirror. He looked like shit, cuts and a few bruises on his face and he was sure on his body. Now that his adrenalin was wearing off he felt about as good as he looked. Dean sighed before pulling his jacket out of the back seat and shrugging it on in an attempt to hide as much of his hurt as he could.

Dean walked up to Kevin's house hoping he would still be out but, no such luck. Dean knocked on the door and when Kevin answered Dean could see all the stuff on the floor and his things lying around. "Hey, Kev" Dean smirked. "I just left some stuff here" Dean pushed past Kevin not even acknowledging the questions he was being asked. Dean threw all his stuff in his bag then went to walk past Kevin again. When Kevin gave some complaint about the mess Dean responded with, "Greater good, dude, greater good" before simply leaving.

Dean called his dad. They agreed to meet at a motel in Athens, Tennessee since that was right about exactly in between the two of them. After they'd left the apartment they'd been in when Sam announced his college plans they'd never gotten a new one opting instead to just jump from motel to motel taking jobs as they came and staying only as long as the job lasted. Having a home base was really only ever for Sammy anyway, so there was no point in continuing to base out of one place for any longer than the job lasted.

Many hours later Dean arrived at the motel to find his father all ready there. Dean went to their room and sat on the left over bed and talked with his dad for a while, they talked about John's job and Dean's. And about how Dean's job had been a bit harder than expected. At that point John Winchester had to face the reality that his son was a great hunter, and he was going to have to let him take more solo jobs. But he also realized that he didn't have to worry so much, his son was a good hunter with good instincts, and he was going to be just fine.

With the TV still on both of the Winchester's fell asleep.

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This took a little longer to get out than I thought it would becaise originally this was going to posted as 2 or 3 seperate cahpters but I ultimality decided I wanted one longer one but had to finish it before I could submit. So, hope you liked it, the next chapter should be out within a week and please please please review!


	3. Break My Heart

Title: Behind Those Eyes

Author: Katie

Summary: A look at the life of Dean Winchester between Sam leaving and the pilot.

Spoilers: None really, at least not so far but a general understanding of the show would help. This chapter loosely references 'Route 666'

Ratings: PG for language

Pairing: None

Authors Note: I hope you like it. Oh, and since I don't have a beta all mistakes are mine.

Distribution: Please! Just let me know.

Feedback: Please!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural. I wish I did though.

**Chapter Three: Break My Heart**

Dean Winchester was 24 years old the first time he fell in love.

Dean and his father, John Winchester arrived in Athens, Ohio a full day ahead of schedule. They were investigating some claims of a 'headless train conductor' that several people in the Lake Hope area had claimed to have seen. They got a hotel room near Lake Hope before going out to eat. While they were out they decided that the next day Dean would go to Ohio University nearby and do some research. He could pose as a student and use their library and ask around with the other students. If anyone would want to share the legends of a headless train conductor with Dean, it would be college girls.

The next morning Dean woke up and took a quick shower. His Dad was all ready gone, so he walked out to the Impala and drove to the local university. He got out and started to wonder around. He asked a few people about local legends but so far hadn't come up with anything useful. He was saying goodbye to some girl, walking backwards, when all the sudden he crashed into another person.

"Oh, sorry…" Dean said spinning around and becoming face to face with Cassie Robinson.

"Watch it" She answered harshly lowering to the ground to pick up her books and note books.

"Sorry" Dean repeated and bent down to help her. When they both stood back up Dean extended his hand to her, "I'm Dean"

"Cassie" She responded and smiled. They talked for a few minutes, just standing in the middle of the walking path between buildings. Finally Cassie glanced at her watch, "I'm late for a class" She said regretfully.

"Okay…okay, well, do you want to get some coffee later?" Dean asked. They set up a place and time to meet, and Cassie pointed Dean in the direction of the school's library.

Dean walked into the library and pulled a chair to a computer. He found a website about Ohio's local haunting and had to laugh to himself. He hated sites like that, but unfortunately it was all he had found. The site didn't turn out to be much help anyway, only telling him that a stretch of the local train tracks were haunted 'for reasons we have yet to identify'. So, he didn't really get any new information. But his father, master hunter, was bound to have come up with more.

Dean made his way back to the hotel and could see his dad's truck in the parking lot. He pulled the Impala next to the truck and walked in to the hotel room. "Hey, dad"

"Hey, Dean, you find anything?" John asked his son as Dean walked to his bed and sat down.

"Not really, you?" Dean asked pulling a paper that had been laying on his dad's bed toward himself.

"Yeah, actually." John said and pulled the paper from Dean's hand and put it back on his bed where it had been. Organized chaos. John picked up another paper and glanced at it using it as a reference for the story, "A long time ago, the people that lived in Moonville, a town that is now gone but was not far from here, were quarantined because of a measles outbreak. The train was supposed to deliver supplies but the engineers were told that anyone who stepped foot in Moonville would die, so everyday they speed through the small city as fast at they could. The food and other supplies in the town started to run low so the town council gathered and decided that someone would travel to the other side of the bridge, the one that separated Moonville from its neighboring town, and flag down the train, since maybe they wouldn't be so scared to stop out side of the doomed town. Jonathan Byrd, a man who had once worked on the rail way and there fore knew the lantern signals to make the train stop, volunteered. The next day he left for the bridge. Moonville's isolated; a mountain on one side, a deep river on the other, the only way in or out was the train tracks, across the bridge and through the tunnel. The tunnel's not long, but it turns. So if you were standing in the very center, you would be in complete darkness. The plan was to stop the train before it reached the bridge so that the engineer would not fear contracting the deadly disease. Jonathan reached the center of the tunnel, and should have had plenty of time to reach the bridge but the train had departed from Columbus early and was already crossing the bridge. Thinking that maybe he could still save the city Jonathan started to wave the lantern back and forth. The train did not stop, like everyday it sped up for its travel through the cursed town. The train hit, killed, and decapitated the man. The members of the small town died within the next few weeks and the town has been abandoned ever since. Now there are stories of a headless man trying to flag down any one who goes any where near the small town, trying to save the town." John looked at his son who appeared engrossed in the story. "So, I figure, we'll go out there tonight and check it out"

"Yeah" Dean nodded. "Yeah…well…I'll be back in a few hours" Dean said and stood up. He started to walk toward the door when…

"Stop…turn." John said, amusement evident in his voice. Dean stopped dead in his tracks, his fingers mere centimeters from the door handle.

"So close" Dean whispered to himself before turning to face his father. He plastered his best 'who me?' smile on his face, "We can't go after it 'till dark and I'll be back by then"

"Where are you going?" John asked, mocking. As long as Dean was back in time for the hunt John couldn't care less where he went, but by the way Dean jumped up, John could tell Dean was excited, and John was having fun.

"To get coffee" Dean said in his best innocent voice, that wasn't lying. At his father's look Dean let out a defeated sigh, "On a date, with a girl I met at the college while I was doing research"

"That would be why you didn't get any actual research done." John teased and Dean rolled his eyes. "We should all research like you" John waited a beat, "Go, be back in time to load up the car and drive out to Moonsville"

"Yes sir, bye" And Dean was out the door and in the Impala. He drove to the small coffee shop Cassie had suggested and found her all ready sitting at a small table.

"Hey…am I late?" Dean asked and sat across from her.

"No, right on time." Cassie smiled as he sat down.

After a moment of awkward silence, and a bit of the normal small talk the two began to get more comfortable. "So, you go to Ohio University. You like it?" Dean asked taking a drink of the coffee that had been brought to the table.

"Yeah, I'm in my last year, journalism major" 22 year old Cassie answered. "Do you go?"

"Uh, no…I was never big on school. I prefer life as my teacher. And I travel quite a bit" Dean replied.

"So what do you do that requires all this traveling?"

"My dad and I, have this…family business." Dean answered, and when he saw Cassie's questioning face he added, "Hunting…um…exterminating kind of."

"That's…weird, but interesting" Cassie laughed. "So, no siblings?"

Dean couldn't help the moment of sadness that came over him and he took a drink of his coffee before answering. "No, I have one brother, Sammy; he's in college though…Stanford" As much as Dean couldn't help the moment of sadness that over took him at the mention of his estranged brother, he also couldn't help the pride that crept into his voice when he said that Sam was attending Stanford. "You have any siblings?"

"No…I always wanted one though" She answered. "Where are you from?"

"Lawrence, Kansans. But my mom died when I was 4, the house caught fire and she didn't make it out, and we moved. Haven't been to Kansans since." Dean answered.

"God…I'm sorry" Cassie wasn't sure what to say.

Dean shook his head slightly, "its okay" Dean shook his head again, "That is weird, I don't normally talk about things and you got me…" Dean's voice trailed off and a smile appeared on his face, "Well what about you? You from Athens, Ohio?"

"No…no, I'm from Cape Girardeau, Missouri, just here for college." Cassie tucked her long curly hair behind her ear, "I'm hoping that after I graduate I'll go home and get a job at the newspaper back home"

"Sounds nice" Dean answered and they talked for a while longer before Dean looked out side. It was just starting to get dark. "Hey, I hate to, but I really have to go." Dean said starting to stand up. "You wanna meet up tomorrow?"

"Yeah" Cassie nodded.

They made plans to get together the next day, Dean paid the bill, and left.

"Hey, dad" Dean said walking into the motel room. They loaded the truck and started to drive out to what used to be Moonsville. They had to park at the foot of the old bridge, as it was no longer wide enough for the truck to make it over. They pulled a few guns loaded with rock salt and one each with bullets out of the truck. They got ready to go. Each holding a flashlight and a gun and each had a knife strapped to their boot, and a gun tucked into the waist band of their pants. They walked down the tracks until they came to the bridge. John went first slowly walking across the long bridge and through the short tunnel that followed it. They reached the small town and wondered around. Graffiti from bored school kids decorated the tunnel and some of the buildings that were left over from when Moonsville was still a bustling town.

They spent many hours there, investigating the run down, weather beaten buildings that remained. They didn't see anything out of the ordinary but they figured that it was just an off day so they would try again the next day and when they saw the beginnings of the sunrise the headed back to the motel to get some sleep.

It went on that way for about a week. Dean would spend the days with Cassie and at night Dean and John would go to the abandoned Moonsville. The weird thing was that they never saw anything, and in keeping with legend the sprit should try to flag down any passersby, including them. One night they saw a light in the tunnel but by the time they reached the center of the turn, nothing was there. They decided to stay a while since they didn't have any other jobs lined up.

The next day Dean picked Cassie up after her last class of the day and they went out for an early dinner. Afterwards Dean drove the now memorized path to cassie's apartment. "You gonna come in for a while?" She asked and Dean glanced at the bright red numbers of the clock in his car – he had a little time.

Dean and Cassie went into the apartment and had some coffee, they talked about everything, and nothing before Dean looked outside and saw the beginnings of nightfall, "I should go…" Dean said slowly and regretfully as he stood up.

Cassie stood up as well, "You always leave when it gets dark" Cassie noted.

_The freaks come out at night _Dean thought to himself but instead only shrugged.

Cassie smiled, "Are you sacred to drive home in the dark…maybe the monsters will get you" Cassie joked walking closer to him.

Dean couldn't help but smirk, "Yep…you caught me…" Dean answered wrapping his arms around Cassie whose body was now pressed to his.

Cassie was about to respond to him bust wasn't afforded the time as Dean's lips came crashing down on hers.

The kiss got heated fast and in the back of Dean's mind he knew if was getting dark, and he had to leave, meet his dad at the hotel, go to the old bridge, help his dad, and try to find that damn ghost. But Cassie hands moved to his jacket and as soon as her shirt hit the floor all bets were off.

They stayed in as much contact as physically possible as they walked to her bed. Various pieces of clothes littered the path from the couch they had been sitting on to the bed they were now laying on.

They removed the last articles of clothing that were clinging to each others bodies before their lips crashed together again.

A few hours later and well after night had fallen Cassie lay happily in Dean's arms. Basking in the afterglow of her the first time she'd had sex with this boy she thought she was falling in love with she leaned up and kissed him softly.

Dean could hear his cell phone ringing but it barley registered as he ran his hand down Cassie's bare back. He heard the small click his phone made after the last ring it would make before sending the caller to voice mail. It was barley two seconds before the phone started to ring again.

Dean groaned before rolling over and grabbing his jeans that were lying haphazardly on the floor. He grabbed his phone from his pocket and looked at the caller ID, "Fuck" he whispered to himself, remembering for the first time that he was supposed to be some where else.

Dean flipped the phone open, "I'm sorry, Sir" Dean said immediately.

"Sorry?" John Winchester's voice came thought the phone and Dean sat straighter without thinking. "Do you have any idea what time it is, we could have missed our chance."

"I know…" Dean stood and started to gather his clothes and get dressed as Cassie watched not knowing what to think. "I just, I lost track of time, it won't happen again"

John shook his head disappointedly, as if Dean could see him. "Lost track of time?" he repeated of as if the concept of it was insane.

Dean didn't know what to say so the phone line went silent until John sighed, "Just get back to the hotel, now"

"Yes sir" Dean barley got that out before the line went dead.

"Cassie, I'm sorry, I have to go" Dean stood, now fully clothed, in front of the bed she was now sitting on, sheets pulled around her shoulders.

"It's okay" She said clearly a little sad.

"I'll stop by tomorrow or the next day for sure" He smiled and kissed her before heading out.

When Dean got back to the hotel him and John had a small fight, _nothing that won't blow over_ Dean thought to himself as he settled into bed.

They both got up early the next morning, but since they had all ready done there research they didn't have anything they needed to do, and Dean didn't want to press his luck by going over to Cassie's so him and John went to a diner to eat and spent the rest of their day just killing time.

At night fall they again loaded up the truck and started out. Almost exactly as they pulled out of the parking lot it started to rain. "Great" John muttered under his breath. They reached the bridge, parked the truck, grabbed whatever weapons they thought they might need and headed out.

They weren't half way to the tunnel before they head a man screaming 'stop' and 'we need help' and various other things along the same line. They started to run toward the tunnel and could see a light. As they got closer they could hear the rushing of a train but both knew the tracks were no longer in use. They were finally close enough to see the train conductor, whose head was firmly intact. He was waving his arms frantically, glancing between a train that wasn't coming and Dean and John. Suddenly they felt a cold wind rush past them and they watched as the ghost of a train conductor was ran over by the train. His head was severed then disappeared, but the man stood, as if nothing happened, as if missing his now missing head was no big deal, he picked up his broken but still working lantern and began to wave it again.

Dean and John looked quizzically at one another before both raised their buns and pumped the ghost full of rock salt to buy themselves some time. They ran into the small, basically nonexistent town trying to figure out what exactly they needed to do in order to kill this ghost. As they ran though they made note of everything, _forgetting a detail will get you killed _John's voice rang in Dean's mind.

"Wait, stop" Dean heard his dad and halted immediately.

"Yes, sir?" He asked walking toward his father.

John held up a piece of metal and Dean had no idea what it was, seeing Dean's confusion John spoke up, "Piece of the train" That was all Dean needed, he pulled the matches out of his pocket and his dad dropped the metal to the ground and covered it with salt. The train conductor reappeared and began his frantic waving again. Dean shook his head once before dropping a match on the offending object. It took a while, but they finally got the thing to burn and when it did the ghost of a man trying to save a town that no longer existed flickered a few times before it disappeared completely.

They got back to the hotel room and went to sleep. The next morning John was up and at the library before Dean was even close to waking. It was John walking back in that finally woke Dean up. "All happened during a storm, don't know how the hell we missed that" John shrugged, "Doesn't much matter, we're done…time to move on, I heard about a job in New York, sound like us"

We're leaving, it finally hit Dean, "Yeah, sounds good, I just have to go take care of something, but I'll be back in a hour or so" Dean stood going toward the door.

"Just don't be too long" John answered.

Dean got to Cassie's and knocked on the door. She answered and kissed him before he came in, "Hey…I didn't hear from you yesterday"

"Yeah, sorry about that, I was just a little busy, hey, I need to talk to you about something – you got a minute?" He asked placing a hand on her waist and guiding her to the couch. He sat down and she followed suite.

"Yeah, sure" Cassie answered and chewed her bottom lip.

"so, me and my dad, we're leaving" Dean blurted out.

_Clearly not into subtle_ Cassie thought to herself, "Why?"

This was where Dean was supposed to say something like, _we just have to _or _we live somewhere else and we're going home _but he didn't want to. He didn't want to lie to Cassie. "You know how I told you that our family business is hunting?" He asked and continued after Cassie nodded, "Well, its hunting…ghosts"

Dean watched Cassie's face go through about a thousand different things, disbelief, anger, everything, before she stood up and backed away from him, "What?" She asked.

Dean stood, "We travel, hunt, and kill supernatural forces"

Cassie rolled her eyes, "Leave"

"Cassie, I –"

She cut him off, "I mean it, go" She answered and he nodded silently and left.

Dean went out to his Impala, his one constant, and drove back towards the hotel. When he got there his father wasn't outside so he just sat in the car. After a long few minutes he pulled out his cell phone and for the first time in a long time dialed Sammy's cell phone. It rang 6 times before his little brother's voice informed him that he wasn't available but he could try the apartment. Dean placed his hand on the steering wheel and gripped it until his knuckles whitened. He hung his head and for the first time in a long time cried. He sat in his car until he was sure all the traces of his tears were gone. He then went back into the hotel. Him and his father packed and when John asked him if he was ready to go his only answer was , "Lets get the hell out of this shit hole"

With that John got in his truck and Dean followed, never to far behind in the Impala.

-----------------

wow, this chapter took forever to come out! I am so sorry about that. I am still not real happy with this chapter. I knew what I wanted it to be about just not really how to get it where I wanted it, so this is what you get! They next chapter shouldn't take this long to come out!

PLEASE review!


	4. Do or Die

Title: Behind Those Eyes

Author: Katie

Story Summary: A look at the Winchester life between Sam leaving and the pilot.

Spoilers: None really, at least not so far but a general understanding of the show would help

Ratings: PG for language

Pairing: None

Authors Note: I hope you like it. Oh, and since I don't have a beta all mistakes are mine.

Distribution: Please! Just let me know.

Feedback: Please!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural. I wish I did though.

**Chapter Four: Do or Die **

Dean Winchester was 25 years old the first time he was truly scared.

Dean was bored. He was sitting on the only bed in his tiny hotel room while his dad was somewhere in the Pacific Ocean hunting some lock ness esq. monster. Since John was out of cell phone range he had made Dean promise not to take any jobs. And honestly, Dean could use the rest anyway, he had gotten pretty beaten up at their last job, that's why he was sitting in a crappy hotel room in Washington instead of in the Ocean with his father.

But Dean had never been one to just sit around so he got dressed and headed out. The town wasn't too big or exciting but it did have a bar and that was really all Dean needed to entertain himself.

Three and a half hours later Dean was back in his hotel room. He was 7 phone numbers and about 250 dollars richer…he always was good at pool.

He took a quick shower, threw on a pair of boxers and went to bed. Two and a half hours later Dean shot up in bed and took in a deep gasp of air. He hadn't woken up like that in a long, long time. Not since that damn demon had took his mom away. That night he had shot awake, exactly the same way, worried about his little brother for seemingly no reason. So he'd laid back down and a few minutes later he heard his mom screaming from Sammy's room. He couldn't ignore it this time, maybe it was nothing, a dream from a brother who hadn't seen the most important person to him in too damn long, but if it wasn't nothing he would never be able to forgive himself.

Dean grabbed his cell phone form the bedside table and highlighted 'Sammy Cell' before pressing send. Sam didn't answer but that was no real shock, Dean waited and when the phone clicked over to voice mail, "Sammy, call me or text me or something..." Dean ordered, "Please" He added, pleading, needing to know his brother was okay.

Since Dean didn't have the ability to find anything out any other way he grabbed some clothes and threw them on. The plan was to find a place with internet access open so he could check hospitals and morgues.

He was grabbing his keys when his cell phone rang. He picked the phone up from the night table and checked the caller ID only to see a number he didn't recognize. But it did have a California area code. "Hello" Dean answered.

"Hello, is this Mr. Dean Winchester?" An overly polite voice he didn't recognize asked.

_Depends on who you ask_ Dean thought to himself. He hated to volunteer his real name to just anyone but it was too damn early to try to think of a way around it and still get the information he might need from this man so a quick "Yeah" was all he gave.

"Hello, my name it Dr. Brown, head of the trauma unit at Stanford's hospital. I'm very sorry to be calling you like this but your brother, Samuel Winchester was in a car accident a few hours ago and you are listed as his next of kin, so you must be consulted for any major decisions."

Dean couldn't even think. He walked backwards until his back hit the cold wall and he slid down until he was sitting on the floor, the chair not even five feet away didn't even register. Dean remembered, the day after Sammy's 18th birthday. John had filled out the paper work so that they were each other's next of kin. His logic had been that while he might not always be at the same place as them at the same time he might not be able to make important decisions but (he thought) Sam and Dean, the inseparable brothers that they were, would always be together, _that worked out great _Dean thought to himself.

"Mr. Winchester?" The voice from the phone Dean had forgotten he was holding asked out.

"Where?" Dean finally asked. The doctor told him the address and Dean said he'd be there as soon as possible. Dean threw his things in his duffle bag, threw that in the Impala and drove as fast as he could toward California.

He hated California. He'd tried to avoid it ever since Sam had moved to Palo Alto. To him California was just one huge reminder that his brother didn't want him in his life. He'd only been out to California three times since Sam left. He'd went with his dad to 'watch out for Sammy' – bull, they spied. John went out at least once a month, more most of the time. Dean could do that…he just couldn't.

Several hours and many cups of coffee later Dean arrived at the hospital. He sat in his car staring at the large building in front of him for a minute before finally going in.

He found the front desk and after a moment of 'I don't want to take a seat I want to see my brother' they directed him to Sam's room.

Dean stood outside of room 319 looking in the large glass window at his baby brother laying in a small white bed, sheets pulled to his shoulders and hooked up to several machines Dean couldn't even begin to guess the use for.

He was frozen. He couldn't move if his life depended on it. Some girl gave him a questioning look as she passed him and walked into Sam's room. She sat in the uncomfortable chair to the left of Sam's bed and just watched him.

Dean closed his eyes _what the hell am I doing here_ Dean thought to himself. He turned on his heels and started to walk out but he couldn't do it, he couldn't just leave his little brother, not when their was any chance Sammy might need him. He turned around again and was standing in front of that stupid glass window. He closed his eye and took a deep breath before slowly opening the door and walking in.

The girl sitting by Sam's bed looked up at him with obvious questions in her eyes. But her presence hardly even registered with Dean. He walked to the opposite side of the bed and stood in front of the uncomfortable that was resting there. He looked down at his baby brother unable to think.

The girl's voice was what finally broke Dean from his thoughts. "Hi…" It was tentative, like she wasn't sure, "I'm Jessica…everyone calls me Jess though…I'm his girlfriend" She was trying to be nice…polite.

"Dean…his brother" Dean wasn't.

A nurse came into the room breaking the awkward silence and proceeded to pull the disgustingly clean sheets down to Sam's waist so she could check whatever she needed to check with Sam.

When she did Dean noticed something….Sam looked fine. Not a scratch on him. Not one bump or bruise, not a cut, not even the smallest mark. "I thought he was in a car accident" It was Dean's turn to break the silence.

"He was" the nurse answered, clearly confused by the question.

The door sung open again and this time a middle aged doctor came in. Dean noticed that his name tag read Doctor Andrew Brown and it took Dean a moment to recall where he knew that name from.

"Are you Dean Winchester?" The doctor asked him.

Dean just nodded as he turned to face him. The doctor took Dean to his office and told him that Sam had been involved in a single car accident. He was driving home from the library and for whatever reason lost control of the vehicle; it spun about four times before settling in a ditch by the road.

_That sound like a bad accident _was all Dean could think to himself. "Why does he look fine?" Dean asked the question he had been wondering earlier.

"That's something that we're not sure about, all of his damage seems to be internal, however we have been unable to locate the root of it. He just seems unable to wake up. Also, he's growing weaker all the time, so I guess I was wondering if you had any information that could shine some light on this." Dr. Brown answered knowing that was a lot of information to throw out at someone all at once.

"No…I mean I only know his medical history until he came to Stanford" Dean said as if he was realizing it as he said it, "But up until that, nothing like this."

Dean and the doctor talked for a little while longer before Dean went back to Sammy's room. He sat in the chair next to the bed opposite of Jessica. "Sammy got a car?"

Jessica smiled, "No, it was our friend Brian's car, Sam was just borrowing it"

Dean nodded _yep, that's why I never let him borrow the Impala _

Dean noticed the lap top bag with an AC/DC sticker on it resting in the corner and smiled to himself. He'd never forget taking Sam to that concert. He had skipped school that day to go buy a ticket for that concert and he wasn't sure why he bought an extra ticket but he did. He picked Sam up from the eighth grade and told him he had got his tickets to AC/DC and Sammy told him to buy him a T-shirt. Dean had rolled his eyes and told him to buy it himself. He then reminded Sam that he had never been to a real concert before and 'there was no better way to do a first concert than AC/DC' so he was taking Sam to a great first concert!

"That Sam's lap top?" He asked.

"Oh, yeah…I was using it…I was at the library when I heard" Jessica answered.

"Can I see it?" Dean asked and Jessica nodded before handing it to him.

"You have to --" Jessica started to explain how the lap top works because it was old are their were some tricks to it but Dean cut her off.

"I know how it works, I bought it" Dean told her. Dean bought the computer for Sam on his birthday in the middle of his sophomore year of high school. Dean had saved all his money until he had enough to buy the one thing Sam had been asking for since the fifth grade, that stupid lap top.

Something about this whole car crash situation wasn't sitting quite right with Dean. He opened the lap top and did as good of a search as he could with the all most not-existent and all speculation information he had.

Three hours later Jessica was asleep, her head resting on the bed next to Sam's hand.

Two hours after that Dean had found three other people who had about the same thing happen to them. All three had died.

One and a half hours after that Dean found an almost random posting done by a man, his younger brother had died at the hands of whatever this was and he has been spending the rest of his life trying to track down the thing that killed his brother.

A half an hour later Jessica woke up and Dean realized how long he'd been on the computer. He pulled the power cord from the bag and plugged the computer into an open socket so it wouldn't die out on him.

Dean shut down the computer to let it rest and looked at his little brother. He wasn't even sure that this wasn't just your garden variety car wreck; all he knew was that something about this didn't feel right and he couldn't do nothing. Even if this wasn't Supernatural, he couldn't just sit and watch his kid brother die.

Jessica went to get something to eat and brought Dean back a cup of coffee. Dean had to smile. That was it – what Sam wanted all along. Normal.

Two hours later Dean's cell phone rang and he had the childish hope that it would be his father whom he'd tried to contact every way he could think of knowing full well that he wouldn't be able to. It was Caleb, a family friend who he called to try and help track down the guy that made that post. "Hey" he answered.

"Got 'em" Caleb answered triumphantly. Caleb told Dean the name and address of the man, Rich Tucker, 34 years old, and currently residing only three hours away.

Dean closed his phone and looked over at Sammy. Jessica had gone to talk to some of their college friends that had showed up.

He smoothed the blankets over his brother before reaching down and brushing hair out of his eyes. He closed his eyes tightly and just stood over his brother a second before walking out.

Three and a half hours later Dean's car was parked out side of Rich Tucker's house. He didn't know exactly why he was there – what exactly he hoped to get from this man, but he had to do something.

He slowly got out of his car and walked to Rich Tucker's door. He knocked and a few moments later a tired looking old man appeared.

"Hi, my name is Dean, I saw your post about something Supernatural killing your younger brother a while back, and I just wanted to ask you some questions abut that"

"No…no more reporters…I'm no crazy…" the older than his years man mumbled as he started to shut the door.

But Dean held his hand out, preventing the man from closing the door. "I'm not a reporter. I'm looking for your help" Dean said and the man stopped pushing the door. He didn't re-open the door, he merely stopped closing it.

"I read something you said online. You said that this thing took your little brother from you" Dean started and the door slowly started to re-open. "Please…please don't let it take mine from me too" The door finally opened and Rich let him inside.

"It…it has your brother?" Rich asked his voice thick with terror and concern.

"Yeah, and I need to know everything you can tell me about _it_." Dean said and Rich let him inside. Rich sat in a chair in his living room and Dean sat across from him, on a couch.

"I never saw it, I'm not crazy, I never believed in ghosts or any of that shit, but this man came to help…told me that some demon had his hold on my little brother, showed me enough proof to make me believe." Rich paused and shook his head a little as if trying to force his thoughts back on track, "My little brother was in a car crash on his way home from a friend's house one night, but it didn't add up. He didn't have any marks on him – not even the smallest scratch, they couldn't even find any internal damage – he was just in a coma that they couldn't bring him out of." Rich took a deep breath, "That man told me that a demon had him. He tried to help me, but it was too late for…" He took in another deep breath and squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, "I don't know who he was, but he gave me these," He walked to a locked cabinet and pulled out two black, braided leather bracelets. "He said that they protect you from the demon. But only one works at a time, so you put this one on" he handed Dean the active bracelet, "and you out this one on your brother" he handed Dean the second bracelet after he had the active one on. "It won't just wake him up and make everything okay, but if you can find a way to wake him up, once he's awake, if you take off your bracelet, his will become active and stay that way unless you put your back on and he takes his off. As long as he is wearing that, the demon can't get him"

Dean took in a long breath, trying to absorb everything. He didn't even know that something like a bracelet could protect against a certain demon, _must have been blessed by a priest with the blood of the Demon _Dean thought to himself. "You have no idea who it was that gave you these, and told you all of this?" Dean asked.

Rich shook his head, "Said his name was Led Zeppelin, but I'm pretty sure that was untrue" Rich smiled, "Sorry"

Dean smiled and shook his head, "How sure are you about these?" Dean gestured to the bracelets.

Rich shrugged, "Never tested 'em."

Dean had to laugh. "Thanks. Is that all, do you know anything else?"

"Thanks everything" Rich answered.

Dean stood up, "well…thank you" he answered pocketing the second bracelet. He shook Rich's outstretched hand and left his cell phone number with him.

It was a long ride back to the hospital for Dean. He had to stop more than once for coffee. What he really needed to do was sleep – he hadn't gotten around to that yet – he couldn't – not when Sam was…he didn't even want to think about it.

When Dean got back to the hospital he went straight to Sam's room and saw Jessica sitting by Sam's bed. "Any change?" he asked and she jumped at the sound of his voice, obviously not having heard him come in.

"He just keeps getting weaker and they don't know why." Jessica answered tears evident in her voice.

"He's going to be just fine" Dean answered, his voice full of confidence. Dean fastened the second bracelet around his brother's wrist, "Make sure he doesn't take that off" Dean said to Jessica and she nodded.

Dean opened Sam's lap top and started researching, breaking ever couple of hours to get coffee and try (to no anvil) to get a hold of his father.

After 7 hours, 16 cups of coffee, and 9 fruitless phone calls, Dean had a plan. A kind of shaky plan that Dean wasn't all to sure would work, but the longer Sam was in that hospital bed the harder it would be to get him out of it, so it was do or die time, and in Dean's life no one had ever mistaken him for the kind of guy would just lay down and die.

This demon only came around every ten years or so and always in the same general area. Always takes one person, same MO every time. The car crash, no marks, because the person never really goes through the crash. The demon pulls them from the car and does his thing, the car crashes and the demon puts the guy back in the car and the hospital holds him, keeps him alive so the demon can slowly drain the life out of him. The facts were few and far between, this thing only came along every ten years and even then only took one person so no one had really put the dots together before. Dean knew it had to manifest somewhere…somewhere close. He did some more digging and found an old abandoned warehouse a few blocks from the hotel that people have been seeing weird unexplainable lights from and heard inhuman noises. _Well, at least I know where I'll be tonight _Dean thought to himself.

He knew he was going to that old warehouse tonight, and he knew that he didn't have all that facts. That he didn't know everything that he should before going after something like this, but time was a luxury that he wasn't being afforded this time around and he had a feeling that after tonight he will have either won or died, but either way Sammy was going to be just fine, he would make sure of that.

He pulled a notebook and a pen from Sam's lap top bag. He wrote a letter to Sam, telling him that he was sorry, for everything, and that Sam meant more to him than anything. He finished by writing that he loved him and folded the paper and walking to the postal office closets to Stanford University. He bought a safety deposit box and left the note inside. He got the key and stuffed it in an envelope; he wrote Caleb's address on it and sent it out.

On the walk back to the hospital he called Caleb and told him that if he didn't hear from Dean by the end of the week he should send the envelope to Sam, and that he would be by to pick up the envelope within the month…if he could.

He got back to the hospital about an hour before night fall. He spent the time in Sam's room. His hand resting on Sam's arm, him pacing, staring at his brother, praying this wasn't the last time he saw Sammy.

Jessica left the room, to go get something to eat, or at least that was what she said. Dean brushed hair out of Sam's eyes and choked back tears, "I love you kid" he whispered before lightly kissing his brother's forehead.

He walked to his car and sat for a moment with arm straight out, his hand gripping the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles were a scary shade of white. He leaned his head against his arm; he took in a shaky breath, trying to calm himself. He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head once before putting the keys in the ignition and drove to the warehouse.

It only took a minute to drive the two blocks, he could have walked, but he was planning to take quite a few weapons up with him and didn't think that walking down the streets of Palo Alto with all those weapons would be a good idea.

He parked out side of the warehouse and grabbed 2, one full of rock salt and one full of iron rod bullets. He strapped a knife to his shin and gathered some other random weapons before taking a deep shaky breath and going in. He stood in the center of the warehouse, not quite sure what he was looking for.

He didn't have to wait long. After a few moments a swirling white and blue light appeared a few feet from Dean. The lights swirled faster and faster until a creature appeared. It looked like a man only taller and with a hunch back, bald and a sickly shade of gray all over. The demon held his hand, palm up in front of him and a swirling circle of green light appeared, the demon threw the ball at Dean but it passed right through him and crashed into the wall behind him, blowing up an old desk that was resting there.

The demon looked confused and Dean smiled. "Here's my theory, you wanna hear it?" Dean had to play this like he was confident, it was a front, but that was something that he could keep to himself, hell – he perfected his poker face at age 12. "I have this cute little bracelet and while I'm wearing it, you can't actually hurt me." Dean raised his arm so the demon could see the braided leather circling his wrist. The demon growled and Dean smirked.

"I can't hurt you…" the demon admitted in a low gravely voice, "But they can." He added and three shorter demons came out from hiding places around the room. They surrounded Dean and without missing a beat he shot the first one with a iron rod bullet and it disappeared after dying, he shot the other two and they did the same.

Dean shot the demon with a rock salt bullet and it visibly recoiled, "You can't hurt me, but I can sure as hell hurt you – I can kill you -"

"But you won't" the demon cut him off, 'Because I have a hold on your little baby brother" the demon mocked and held his hand out again and this time the light that swirled there was red and after a moment there was a picture of Dean standing over Sam at the hospital in the center of it.

Another one of the smaller demons appeared to the left of Dean, trying to sneak up on him, Dean didn't even turn to look at it when he shot it.

"What I'm here for is simple; I want you to let my brother go." Dean said and the demon smiled.

A smaller demon was sneaking up behind Dean. Its arms out stretched and its hand glowing fiery red.

"Why would I do that, I need your brother, without him I'll die" The demon answered.

"If you keep you're hold on him, I'll kill you" Dean answered his voice low. "I'm willing to make a trade…could you be any louder?" Dean asked turning slightly so he could see the small demon trying to sneak up on him. It stopped dead in tracks and Dean didn't even blink when he shot it.

The demon told all the lesser demons to go and Dean saw several flashes of light as they disappeared. "This trade you were talking about?"

"It's simple, if you let him go, you can do whatever you want with me." Dean shook his head once, "Take me instead." Dean finished his voice portraying confidence he didn't really possess.

The demon looked like it was deciding, "Think about it, you can do whatever you want to me and I won't fight it, I'm older than him, stronger, it's smart, take my life for his." Dean said and the demon just stared at him.

"Fine" it growled, "Get rid of that thing" it added with disgust.

_There is _no_ way I look _that_ stupid _Dean thought to himself. "No, you have to let my brother go, you have to show me" Dean answered.

The demon held his hand out again, the red lights swirling and a picture of Sam slowly waking up and Jessica throwing his arms around him played out in the center of it immediately. Dean was about to demand more proof until his cell phone rang. "Hello" he mumbled into it absently.

"This is Dr. Brown from the hospital, Mr. Winchester I just wanted to inform you that your brother has woken up and we still have some tests to run but from we can tell right now he looks fine" Dean folded his cell phone closed and stuffed it back in his pocket.

He fingers the braided leather on his wrist for a moment before unfastening it and letting it fall. Dean hit the ground before the bracelet did.

Twenty-three and a half hours later Dean opened his eyes and saw the demon standing over him. "What's going on?" Dean groaned, hating that he sounded so helpless but he knew that he was. He tried to move but couldn't, that's when he noticed that he couldn't feel anything either. He cast his eyes downward and could just barley make out all the marks, and blood that laced his body.

"You can't feel anything because I'm making it that way" the demon answered his unasked question. "You are stronger than I thought, I didn't need all of you and what I took from your brother to survive" the demon's low gravely voice informed him. "I'm still having my fun…this won't be the last you see of me" and a moment later the blue and while lights swirled in the air and the demon disappeared.

The second he did Dean screamed out in pain. Finally able to move he looked down at himself. Covering in more blood than he'd ever seen before and large long lacerations that he knew would scar. He tried to move but every thing hurt too much. He just laid there for a long moment hating the helplessness but not knowing what else to do.

After a long time Dean finally stood up. He gripped everything he could on his path out of the building knowing that he couldn't stand (let alone walk) on his own. He picked up his weapons on his way out, he wanted to leave them but they had his prints all over them and he didn't think that was something the cops needed to find. After a long few minutes he made it back to his car and collapsed in the seat. He just sat there, trying to breath for a long time before driving to the first shity motel he could find. He pulled a hoddie and long black pants on to hide his viscous marks, he pulled the hood up to cover his face before buying a room and puling the first aide kit in with him. He cleaned out the wounds before stitching the ones that he could and wrapping practically his whole body.

Two days later when he could walk on his own again he drove to the hospital. He stood out side his brother's room watching him through the large glass window. He saw Sammy sitting on the bed and Jessica next to him. They were talking and laughing.

Sam saw him through the window and stopped. They just started at each other for a long moment before Dean smirked and half waved at his little brother. Sam smiled and waved back before Dean walked out.

Dean sat back down in his car; he took in a deep breath and smiled before starting the car and driving the hell out of Palo Alto.

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The responce to this fic has been amazing, thank you so much to every one who has reviewed, you guys make me SO happy! I know my chapters take a while to come out, thats cause I normally write much shorter chapters but I decided to do each year as one chapter so they are longer! Any how, I hope you like it, the next chapter will be the last one.

Please review!


	5. Back to Being Brothers

Title: Behind Those Eyes

Author: Katie

Summary: A look at the Winchester life between Sam leaving and the pilot.

Spoilers: None really, at least not so far but a general understanding of the show would help

Ratings: PG for language

Pairing: None

Authors Note: I hope you like it. Oh, and since I don't have a beta all mistakes are mine.

Distribution: Please! Just let me know.

Feedback: Please!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural. I wish I did though. **Much of the dialoge in this chapter came straight from the pilot ep. **

**Chapter Five: Back to Being Brothers **

Dean Winchester was 26 years old the last time he would feel truly alone.

Dean was just finishing up the ridiculous voodoo gig in New Orleans, the whole thing was insane, scorned lovers and the sort playing with magic they didn't even really believe in let alone understand.

It had been too long since he had spoken to his father. John Winchester always made sure that they checked in with each other once a day at the very least. He tried to get in contact with his dad every way he knew how but nothing worked. He decided to stay in his hotel that night and head to Jericho, California where his dad was working a case the next morning.

Around 2:30 that night/the next morning Dean's phone rang. He rolled over, onto his back and rubbed the back of his hand over his eyes. "You've got to be kidding me" he mumbled and his hand found the phone on the night table just as it clicked over to voice mail.

He pulled the phone to him and clicked on his missed call list. He saw his Dad's name staring back at him and smiled. Excitedly Dean clicked to hear the voice mail.

"Dean, something is starting to happen, I think it's serious. I need to try to figure out what's going on static be very careful Dean, we're all in danger."

Dean shot up, suddenly very awake. He listened to the voice mail again, instantly recognizing it as having an EVP under it. He ran out to the car and got what he needed. He recorded the message on to a tape so he could slow it down; he then ran it through a gold wave and took out the hiss. He pressed play ready to listen to his brand new EVP.

A woman saying "I can never go home"

Dean tried to call his father several more times but never got a hold of him. He knew that whatever this was, it was big. Just from his dad's voice when he said that 'they were all in danger' no good was going to come of this.

Wait… 'all in danger'… 'all'. Sammy! If Sam was in danger he had to do something about it, he couldn't just let him be a sitting duck to danger. Dean checked his map, _if I shag ass I can make it before morning. _

The drive to Palo Alto felt long, _I fucking hate California_.

When Dean finally parked his car out side Sam's apartment complex he got out and looked up at Sam's window, no lights. He sighed before climbing up the fire escape. He walked around the apartment slowly, thinking to himself that if Sam didn't hear him soon he would be a little worried.

Dean sees a shadow move out of the corner of his eye and has to smile before grabbing Sam and doing a basic move to him. Dean knows that Sam doesn't realize it's him as they fight and that's when he realizes how long its really been since they've talked. Dean takes him to the ground and sits on top of him with a triumphant smile. "Whoa, easy, tiger." He taunts.

"Dean?" Sam asked and Dean kind of wants to smack him, _what you forget about me all ready? _He thinks and laughs. "You scared the crap out of me."

Dean smiles and nods once, "That's cause you're out of practice" Dean is taken by surprise when Sam does a move and lands himself on top with a triumphant smile of his own. "Or not…Get off me."

They both stand up and suddenly Sam is serious, "Dean, what the hell are you doing here?"

Dean's not ready to be serious quite yet, "Well I was looking for a beer."

"What the _hell_ are you doing here?" Sam asks again, _not happy to see me little bro? _Dean thinks and cant keep the spite out of it.

"Okay, all right, we gotta talk." Dean remembers his dad and the kind of danger he thinks that all three of them are in.

"Uh, the phone?" Sam says like it's the most obvious thing in the world and Dean flashes back to all the times he called just to get Sam's voicemail.

"If I'd have called, would you have picked up?"

Sam is saved of having to answer when Jessica walks in. "Sam?"

"Jess, hey. Dean, this is my girlfriend Jessica." Sam says glancing between the two.

"Wait, your brother dean?" Jess asks and Dean realizes that she didn't tell that they met when he was sick.

He goes along with it, "I love the Smurfs." And it's true; he always did "You know I gotta tell you, you are completely out of my brother's league."

He's made her self conscious, "Just let me put something on"

"No, no, no, I wouldn't dream of it…Seriously" _I don't plan on being here long anyway_ Dean added silently. "Anyway, I gotta borrow your boyfriend here, talk about some private family business, but, uh, nice meeting you." _Yeah, meeting you._ Dean thought sarcastically to himself.

"No. No. Whatever you wanna say you can say it in front of her." Sam said moving to stand by Jessica and Dean couldn't help but be upset for a moment.

"Okay. Um…dad hasn't been home in a few days." Dean said hoping that Sam would take the hint. He didn't.

"So he's working over-time on a "Miller Time" shift; he'll stumble back in sooner or later." And Dean couldn't believe how little Sam seemed to think of their dad.

"Dad's on a _hunting_ trip and he hasn't been home in a few days." _Don't try me, little brother _Dean hoped the warning came through in his voice. He was dangerously close to saying _exactly _what he meant right in front of Jessica.

"Jess, excuse us. We have to go outside." Sam said, defeated. And Dean followed him down a flight of stairs before Sam abruptly turned around. "What the hell, Dean"

Dean sighed, "Dad's missing, has been for more than a week, even got a weird voice mail from him. I need your help" It wasn't exactly what Dean had intended to say, but it worked well enough.

Sam shook his head a little, "I mean come on; you can't just break in, in the middle of the night, and expect me to hit the road with you."

Dean closes his eyes and sighs trying to think of a way to make Sam hear him, "You're not hearing me Sammy. Dad's _missing_;I need you to help me find him."

Sam shakes his head again and Dean had a split second urge to smack him, "You remember the poltergeist in Amherst, or the devil's gates in Clifton? He was missing then too, he's always missing and he's always fine"

It was Dean's turn to shake his head, this was different, he could feel it, he'd been hunting well past long enough to trust an instinct as strong as this one, "Not for this long. Now you gonna come with me or not?" Dean was loosing his patience, and time that could prove precious.

"I'm not" was Sam's only answer and Dean was a little blind sided.

"Why not?"

"I swore I was done hunting for good." Sam said and Dean rolled his eyes.

"Come on, it wasn't easy, but it wasn't that bad." _Sissy_ Dean added to himself.

Sam shook his head again and Dean clinched his fist by his side to keep from reaching out and smacking him, "Yeah? When I told dad when I was scared of the thing in my closet he gave me a .45."

Dean gave him a _yeah…and…_ look and added, "Well what was he supposed to do?"

"I was 9 years old. He was supposed to say 'Don't be afraid of the dark.'" Sam said and Dean sighed, remembering most clearly that there had in fact been a _thing _in Sammy's closet.

"Don't be afraid of the dark? What are you kidding me of course you should be afraid of the dark! You know what's out there!" That made Dean angry, they didn't have the luxury of ignorance.

Sam didn't have a real response so he shook his head once, "Yeah I know but still-- the way we grew up after mom was killed, and dad's obsession to find the thing that killed her, but we still haven't found the damn thing, so we kill everything we can find."

"Save a lot of people doing it, too." Dean was proud of that. He wasn't always the best person in the world, didn't always do the right thing at the right time, but he had saved dozens, maybe hundreds of lives in his own lifetime and he would be doing it until he couldn't anymore.

"You think mom would have wanted this for us?" Dean turns on heels and starts to walk outside, _don't you dare use mom against me, little brother _Dean thought but Sam continued. "The weapon training and melting the silver into bullets? Man, Dean, we were raised like warriors."

Dean's angry and its becoming harder and harder to hide, "So, what are you gonna do? You just gonna live some normal, apple-pie life? Is that it?"

Sam rolls his eyes, "No. Not normal. Safe"

Dean scoffs and nods his head once, "And that's why you ran away?"

Sam looks down at the ground before answering, "I was just going to college. It was dad who said if I was gonna go, I should stay gone. And that's what I'm doing."

_If you really believe that dad meant that I give you way more credit than you deserve _Dean though to himself and shook his head once, as if trying to physically force the memory of the fight from his mind. "Yeah well dad's in real trouble if he's not dead already, I can feel it. I can't do this alone."

"Yes, you can" Sam says and they both know he's right.

"Yeah. Well, I don't want to." Is Dean's response. _This could not be more of a family thing. _

Sam sighed, knowing that he's never really been able to say know to Dean, but couldn't help the small smile when he remembered that it went both ways, "What was he hunting?"

Dean smirked before opening the trunk of the Impala, then the locked compartment with his weaponry, "All right, let's see. Where the hell did I put that thing?" mumbling to himself.

"So when dad left, why didn't you go with him?" Sam asked, the thought just occurring to him.

"I was working my own gig. This voodoo thing down in New Orleans" _bush league. _Dean answered still rifling through his things.

"Dad let you go on a hunting trip by yourself?" Sam was really surprised.

"I'm 26, dude" _a lot changes in 4 years_. Dean found what he was looking for and pulls a piece of paper out of the book, "All right, here we go. So dad was checking out this two-lane blacktop outside of Jericho, California. About a month ago this guy…" Dean pointed to the newspaper clipping, "…they found his car but he'd vanished, completely M.I.A."

"So maybe he was kidnapped." Sam countered. He always tried so hard to find the logical answer; problem was that it was never there.

"Yeah well, here's another one in April," Dean hands several news clipping to Sam pointing to each one to prove his point, "another one in December '04, '03, '98, '92. Ten of them over the past 20 years, all men, all same 5-mile stretch of road. Started happening more and more so dad went to go dig around. That was about three weeks ago. I hadn't heard from him since, which is bad enough." Dean pulls out his cell phone and plays the voice mail for his brother, "Then I get this voicemail yesterday"

When the voice mail is over Sam looks at his brother, "You know there's EVP on that?"

Dean smiled, he was a little proud, "Not bad, Sammy. Kind of like riding a bike isn't it? All right. I slowed the message down, and ran it through a Gold Wave took out the hiss, and this is what I got."

"I can never go home" played the EVP

"Never go home" Sam repeated as if that would help him make sense of it.

Dean threw his phone back in the trunk and slammed it shut; it's probably not smart to have his weapons on display at Stanford, even if it was the middle of the night. "You know in almost two years I've never bothered you. Never asked you for a thing…" Dean trailed off, knowing that Sam knew exactly where he was going with that.

Sam rolled his eyes, "All right. I'll go. I'll help you find him. But I have to get back first thing Monday. Just wait here."

"What's first thing Monday?" Dean would always be curious by nature. _Its always safer to know _John Winchester's voice rang in his ear.

Sam was almost embarrassed to say, "I have this…I have an interview"

"What, a job interview? Skip it." Do now – think later. That was Dean.

Sam rolled his eye, some things never change, "It's a law-school interview, and it's my whole future on a plate."

"Law school" Dean repeated his voice a mix of pride and disbelief.

"So we got a deal or not?" Sam asked and when Dean nodded he went back upstairs to pack.

Dean walked over to the Impala and sat on the hood. He glanced up at Sam's window and could see the shadows of him packing and Jessica walking around behind him, presumably asking questions. He shook his head again, who would have thought.

Dean was happy to have Sam coming with him, they had to find John and Sam would be able to help greatly with that. But more, Dean hadn't seen…really seen his baby brother in 4 years. But at the same time Dean felt like he never should have come here, never should have pulled Sam out of his picture perfect 'I'm going to be a lawyer' life.

Luckily for him, Dean didn't have much time to contemplate his decisions because Sam came down the stairs and outside with a duffle bag in one hand. "Lets do this" Sam mumbled threw his duffle next to Dean's in the back seat of the Impala and slid in the passenger seat of Dean's car. Dean slid in to drivers seat, put the key in the ignition and turned it, turned the volume dial on the radio to the right, causing 'highway to hell' to come through the speakers Dean spent 3 weeks installing when he was 17, and pulled away from Stanford, and toward their job. "This feels oddly familiar" Sam mumbled and Dean smiled.

"Oh, yeah, just like old times" Dean teased in a sing-song voice and Sam lightly hit his arm. Dean couldn't help but smile.

A little time passed before either one of them spoke again. It wasn't quite awkward, but it wasn't quite comfortable either.

Sam, finally tiring of the AC/DC tape reached out and turned the volume down to next to nothing. Dean rolled his eyes and turned it back up. Sam reached out again and Dean smacked their hand. Both of them laughed a little and Sam put his hands up in surrender.

Not long after that Sam leaned his head against the window and fell asleep. Dean smiled before reaching over and turning the tape off.

Sam didn't wake up until Dean was pulling the Impala into a gas station. "I'll be right back" Dean said but knew that his words hardly even registered with his younger brother.

Dean got out and filled the Impala's gas tank before going inside the small station. He picked up the kind of breakfast bar a juice he liked before turning to find the weird kind that Sam liked. He glanced out the window of the station at his little brother, sitting in the passenger seat, riffling through the old shoe box of rock and roll cassette tapes that lived under the passenger side seat. And for that moment Dean could see 12 year old Sammy, the first time John let Sam ride with Dean. Dean smiled sadly before paying for the food he was carrying and the gas he had pumped.

Dean walked back toward the car and when Sam looked up he waved the food "Hey, you want breakfast?"

Sam shook his head once, abandoning his search for music to answer his brother, "No thanks. So how'd you pay for that stuff? You and dad still running credit card scams?"

Dean chuckled, "Yeah well…" he shrugged, "hunting ain't exactly a pro-ball career. Besides, all we do is apply, it's not our fault they send us the cards."

"Yeah and what names did you write on the application this time?" Sam's voice was knowing and Dean smiled.

Dean took his seat in the car as he answered. "Uh…Bert Aframian and his son, Hector. Scored two cards out of the deal."

Sam laughed, "Sounds about right. I swear man; you gotta update your cassette-tape collection."

"Why?" he sounded defensive.

Sam rolled his eyes, "Well for one they are cassette tapes, and two," Sam pulled out a tape, "Black Sabbath? Motorhead? Metallica? It's the greatest hits of mullet rock"

Dean rolled his eyes and grabbed the Black Sabbath tape from Sam's hand, "House rules, Sammy. Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cake hole." Even Dean could hear John's voice saying it as he did.

"You know Sammy is a chubby 12 year old. It's Sam, okay?" And Dean could remember Sammy's 16th birthday when he declared that he was no longer Sammy but Sam, an adult. Both Dean and John had been nice enough to wait 'till Sam left the room to burst into uncontrollable laughter. It was his birthday after all.

Dean smiled and turned the volume on the radio higher, "I'm sorry, I can't hear you. The music's too loud." Dean smirked and pulled out of the gas station. 7 miles to Jericho.

Dean reached into the back seat when they stopped at a red light. When he turned back around he was holding a folder, which he handed to Sam. Sam opened it to find phone numbers to all the hospitals and morgues within a 30 mile radius of Jericho. Sam didn't have to ask what Dean wanted him to do; they'd done it before after all. Sam pulled out his cell phone and started.

About 20 minutes later Sam closed his phone then the folder, "All right, so there's no one matching dad at the hospital or morgue, so that's something, I guess."

Dean nodded slightly. They reached the bridge where the 'accident' had happened and Dean let out a long breath when he saw the cop cars around. "Check it out" Dean said as he parked and Sam looked up as Dean reached in front of Sam, into the glove box to retrieve the box of fake IDs that lived there. He pulled out two and handed one to Sam. "Let's go" He said before getting out of the car and walking toward the scene.

One of the police on the bridge yelled down to one on the ground below, "Did you guys find anything?" and Dean was careful to listen to everything going on to see if he could find anything new out.

"No, nothing" was the response and Dean shook his head once.

The first police man walked over to the only car sitting on the bridge and started to look at it, talking to another cop standing behind him, "No sign of struggle, no footprints, no fingerprints. Spotless, it's almost too clean."

"So this kid Troy, he's dating your daughter isn't he?" the cop from behind the first one asked.

"Yeah" accompanied by a sigh was the response.

"How's Amy doing?" Dean stored the information away.

"She's putting up missing posters downtown."

Dean felt that he had learned all he was going to at this point, it was time to jump in, "You fella's had another one just like this last month, didn't ya?"

"Who are you?"

Dean put on a cocky smile and flipped open his wallet, "Federal Marshals''

"You two are a little young for Marshals, aren't you?"

Dean smiled, "Thanks, that's awfully kind of you. You did have another one just like this correct?"

Dean knew the police man was skeptical, but push to shove he had to answer, "Yeah, about a mile up the road. There have been others before that."

Sam spoke up and it was almost like he had never left, "So this victim, you knew him?"

The cop nodded, "In a town like this, everybody knows everybody"

Dean started to circle the car, "Any connections between the victims besides that they're all men?"

"No, not so far as we can tell."

Sam spoke up again, and it hit Dean how much he missed having Sam on these trips "So what's the theory?"

"Honestly? We don't know. Serial murder? Kidnapping ring?"

"Well that is exactly the kind of crack police work that I'd expect out of you guys." Dean taunted, letting himself have some fun. Sam stepped on his foot; then again there were time where Dean wouldn't mind Sam being away at school. Or at least that's what he liked to tell himself.

"Thank you for your time" Sam glanced between the police men, "Gentlemen." Sam and Dean start to walk away and once they are a good distance Dean reached up and smacked the back of Dean's head, "Ow! What was that for?"

"Why do you have to step on my foot?" Dean asked

"Why do you have to talk to police like that?" Sam countered. _Some things never change_, Dean thought to himself.

Dean rolled his eyes, "Come on. They don't really know what's going on. We're all alone on this. I mean if we're gonna find dad we've gotta get to the bottom of this thing ourselves."

Sam cleared his through loudly to get Dean's attention and nodded behind Dean to let him know that a few official looking men had joined the cops that they had just been talking to.

"Can I help you boys" one of them asked.

"No sir, we were just leaving." Dean answered and smiled broadly at the two men that walked by, "Agent Mulder, Agent Scully" this time Sam let him have his fun and they walked back to the Impala.

They got back in the car and Sam looked over at Dean, "Smart ass"

Dean smirked and pulled the Impala away from the bridge. "Where we going now?" Sam asked and Dean shook his head.

"To find Amy" he answered. When the only response was a 'what the hell' look from Sam he continued, "The guy, Troy, that was taken or killed or what ever…Amy's his girl"

Sam shook his head, sometimes, Dean amazed him. He was so damn good at what he did. Sam just wished that 'what he did' wasn't hunting.

They drove the main street of the tiny town until they saw a girl hanging 'missing' posters and Dean stated the obvious, "I'll bet you that's her."

A passive "Yeah" was all Sam said.

Dean parked the car and fed the meter before him and Sam walked up to the girl, "You must be Amy."

"Yeah" was her only response and Dean nodded.

"Troy told us about you, we're his uncles. I'm Dean, this is Sammy."

Amy looked between them, "He never mentioned you to me"

Dean nodded again, "Well that's Troy, I guess. We're not around much; we're up in Modesto. So we're looking for him too, and we're kind of asking around"

Another girl, about the same age as Amy walked over and put a comforting hand on Amy's back, "Hey, are you okay?"

Amy nodded weakly, "Yeah"

Sam smiled sympathetically, "Do you mind if we ask you a couple questions?"

Amy attempted a smile, "Um, yeah, sure, I guess" she nodded and pointed inside the small restaurant that she had just been hanging posters outside of.

They sat down and a booth and when a waiter came over to take their order the two girls got coke a cola and Sam and Dean got coffee.

Sam spoke up, he was always better with that touchy-feely-self-help-yoga crap (as Dean put it), "So, what do you know about his…disappearance?"

Amy stared down into her soda and took a deep breath before looking up and answering Sam's question "I was on the phone with Troy. He was driving home. He said he would call me right back, and he never did"

Sam's eyebrow's furrowed together in a mix of confusion and sympathy, "He didn't say anything strange or out of the ordinary?"

Amy shook her head, "No, nothing I can remember."

Sam noticed the pentagram necklace that Amy was wearing and smiled, "I like your necklace."

Amy smiled and pulled the necklace all the way out of her shirt, holding it up a little, "Troy gave it to me. Mostly to scare my parents with all that devil stuff."

Sam shook his head once, "Actually, it means just the opposite. A pentagram is protection against evil, really powerful. I mean, if you believe in that kind of thing." _Once a hunter…_

Dean rolled his eyes, "Okay, thank you "Unsolved Mysteries". Here's the deal ladies--the way Troy disappeared—something's not right. So if you've heard anything…"

Amy and her friend glanced at each other and Dean looks between them, "What is it?"

Amy's friend looked up from her soda, "Well, it's just…with all these guys going missing, people talk."

"What do they talk about?" Sam and Dean asked at the same time and looked at each other, Dean gave Sam a 'don't do that look' and Sam rolled his eyes.

The girl spoke up again, telling the story carefully, as if she was afraid they would find her crazy, "It's kind of this local legend. This one girl, she got murdered out on Centennial like…decades ago. Well supposedly she's still out there. She hitchhikes, and whoever picks her up—Well, they disappear forever."

Sam and Dean exchange a look and Dean nods once _jackpot_ before turning his attention back to the girls, "Well, we gotta go, but we'll be around if you think of anything else"

The girls smiled and Sam and Dean slid out of the booth and walked back to the Impala. They both get in, "That has to be it right?" Sam asked

"How many times has it just been talk?" Dean countered. They drove to the town's small library and walked in. They walked to a corner, farthest away from people as they could get.

Dean sat down in front of the computer and Sam snagged the chair from the computer next to it and watched over Dean's shoulder as Dean pulled up the 'Jericho Herald' web page and typed 'Female Murder Hitchhiking' in the search bar. The page loads only to say 'No results found' and Dean rolls his eyes. He deleted the words and types 'Female Murder Centennial Highway' in the search bar. It came back 'No results found' again and Dean sighed before deleted the words again he went to type again but Sam reached across him and grabbed the mouse, "Let me try"

Dean smacked his hand, "I got it" Sam pushed Dean's computer chair and it rolled about a foot away. "Dude" Dean said when he stopped his chair. He rolled back over in front of the computer, "You're such a control freak."

Sam didn't even acknowledge his statement, "So angry spirits are born out of violent death, right?"

_Why do you ask questions when you all ready know the answer, _"Yeah" Dean said.

Sam nodded once and leaned over Dean again, "Maybe it's not murder" Sam mumbled as he typed 'Female Suicide Centennial Highway' a results page came up and Sam smiled cockily at his brother. He then read from the computer screen, "This was 1981. Constance Welch, 24 years old; Jumps off Sylvania Bridge, drowns in the river."

Dean ignored his brother's cocky smile, "Does it say why she did it?"

"Yeah"

"What?"

Sam glanced from his brother to the computer, "An hour before they found her, she calls 911. Her two little kids are in the bathtub, she leaves them alone for a minute, she comes back, they aren't breathing. Both die."

"Hmm…" Dean nods once.

Sam scrolled down to find an interview with the woman's husband, ""Our baby's were gone and Constance just couldn't bear it," said husband, Joseph Welch."

Dean looks up at the computer and sees a picture. He reached across Sam and put the picture in the center of the screen, "That bridge look familiar to you?" it was the one the just left.

"It'll be dark soon, we'll go then" Dean said with a slight nod. "Lets go get some food" Dean said and stood up. They walked to the Impala and drove to the Wendy's Dean had seen down the street. They went in and ate.

They talked about little things, Jessica, and hunts Dean had been on. Nothing too important or heavy. Not wanting to break what ever silent agreement they had fallen into. It amazed Dean that after 4 years of being mad at Sam, of not talking to him once, of wanting so badly to hate him for abandoning he and their father that they could so easily slip back into being brothers. That they could so easily ignore the last for years. Dean half smiled and took a bite of his cheeseburger.

As darkness fell Dean and Sam threw away the trash from their meal and walked out to the Impala. They got in and Dean drove the small streets to the old bridge. He parked at the end of the bridge, pulled the keys from the ignition and dropped them into his pocket. They got out of the car and started walking the bridge.

"So this is where Constance took the swan dive." Dean spoke up.

Sam glanced at Dean then looked over the edge, down at the muddy water below before speaking, "So you think dad would have been here?"

In that moment, Sam sounded to Dean like the little kid he used to care of in hotel rooms. When John would be gone longer than anticipated, Sam would always be the one to work first and Dean would pull out the worn copy of the 'Dr. Seuss's Baker's Dozen' book and let Sam pick a story for Dean to read to him. Dean shook the memory from his head before answering, "Well he's chasing the same story and we're chasing him."

Sam shrugged, "Okay so now what?"

The answer was obvious to Dean and he didn't understand how it couldn't be to Sam, "Now we keep digging till we find him. It might take a while."

Sam fought the erge to roll his eyes, "Dean, I told you, I've gotta get back by -"

"Monday" Dean interrupted, his voice coming out harsher than he intended, he forced his voice to calm before he continued, "Right, the interview."

Sam nodded once, "Yeah"

"Yeah, I forgot. You're really serious about this aren't you? You think you're just gonna become some lawyer? Marry your girl?" Dean smirked. There was a time that Dean thought about 'marrying his girl' back when 'his girl' was Cassie, _but then she found out the truth and I became crazy in her eyes. _He shook his head.

"Maybe. Why not?" Sam shrugged.

Dean raised his eyebrows, "Does Jessica know the truth about you? I mean, does she know about the things you've done?"

Sam shook his head once before answering, "No and she's not ever going to know."

Dean smirked, "Well that's healthy. You can pretend all you want, Sammy. But sooner or later you're going to have to face up to who you really are." Dean started walking down the bridge.

Sam followed him, "Who is that?"

"One of us" Dean answered simply.

"No, I'm not like you. This is not going to be my life." Sam shook his head harshly.

_What the hell is so wrong with me? _Dean thought but settled for, "Well you've got a responsibility."

Sam spoke, his voice becoming harsher and angrier with every word, "To dad and his crusade? If it weren't for pictures I wouldn't even know what mom looks like. What difference would it make? Even if we do find the thing that killed her, mom's gone, and she isn't coming back."

For a split second Dean lost his temper, if he wasn't doing this for him mom what the hell was he doing? Dean grabbed his younger brother by his shirt and slammed him against a rail holding the bridge over the water beneath. "Don't talk about her like that." Dean let his younger brother go all ready feeling bad about loosing it on him like that. He tuned his head and saw a woman in white on the side of the bridge, "Sam…"

Sam turned to look at her and without warning the woman let go of the bridge. She fell and Sam and Dean ran to where she was but she wasn't in the water, the water hadn't been disturbed, and there he been no slashing sound. "Where'd she go?" Dean asked.

"I don't know" Sam answered. The sound of the Impala roaring to life filled the air and Dean and Sam both turned to look over at it.

"What the…" Dean's voice, Dean's everything was furious. That was _his _car.

"Who's driving your car?" Sam asked.

Dean couldn't stop himself from rolling his eyes. He pulled the car's keys from his pocket and held them in front of Sam's face. Suddenly the car starts driving toward them and Dean stuffs the keys back into his pocket before him and Sam start to run.

Sam was panicked, "Come on Dean. Let's go! Go!"

Realizing that they are not going to be able to out run the car they both jump off the side of the bridge. Well…kind of. Dean fell into the murky water below but Sam was able to hold onto the railing of the bridge.

Sam slowly pulled himself back on the bridge and looked down at the muddy water below him, searching for his older brother, "Dean…Dean…" He screamed searching.

Dean pulled himself from the water, now covered in the mud that filled the lake, "What?"

Sam breathed a sigh of relief, "Hey, are you all right?"

Dean looks down at himself, covered in mud and God knows what else, "I'm super"

Sam laughs and Dean Walks back up the bridge. He starts inspecting the car and after a long moment Sam speaks up, "Car all right?"

Dean nodded, "Yeah whatever she did to it, it seems all right now. That Constance chick…" Dean paused before yelling, "What a bitch!" all most hoping she had stuck around to hear him. _MY CAR! _

"Well she doesn't want us digging around, that's for sure" Sam said and they both sat on the hood of the car, "So where's the trail go from here, genius?" Sam paused and looked at his older brother clearly enjoying taunting him, "You smell like a toilet."

"Shut the fuck up" Dean said, but couldn't keep the smile from his voice. He reached over and pushed Sam lightly. Sam pushed Dean back and they both laughed before jumping off the hood of the car and getting in. They drove back in to the main part of town and Dean stopped at the first little motel he saw. They walked in and Dean dropped 'his' credit card on the counter, "One room please"

The man at the desk picked up the card and looked it over, he seemed just a little to interested for Dean's liking. "You guys having a reunion or something?"

Sam spoke before Dean got a chance to, "What do you mean?"

The desk clerk looked up at them, "That other guy, Bert Aframian. He came in and bought out a room for the whole month."

Sam and Dean exchanged a look, "What room?" Dean asked. The desk clerk gave them the number and Dean walked to the concrete side walk that to all the doors in the motel. He stood out side of 'Bert Aframian's' room and waited with his back toward the room, making sure no one came in.

Dean is momentarily thrown when a hand reaches out from the room and grabs the back of his jacket, it pulls him into the room and shuts the door behind him. When Sam lets go he straightens his jacket and looks around the room. The bed was unmade, not that a messy bed was unnatural for a Winchester, but there were photos and news paper clippings wallpapering the walls.

"Whoa" Is all Sam can say as he looks around.

Dean turns on a light and looks around. He sees a half eaten hamburger, "I don't think he's been here for a couple days, at least." he shakes his head once before focusing on the clipping on the walls.

San is on the other side of the room, looking at the salt circle by the door, "Salt, cats-eye shells. He was worried. Trying to keep something from coming in." He notices Dean looking at the newspaper on the wall, "What do you got here?"

Dean glances at his brother before facing the wall again, "Centennial Highway victims. I don't get it. I mean different men," Sam moves closer to where Dean is "different jobs, ages, ethnicities. There's always a connection, right? What do these guys have in common?"

One of the papers says 'Woman in white' on it and that catches Sam's eye. He turned the light to better see it and laughed to himself. "Dad figured it out" he said it matter-of-factly.

Dean turned to face Sam, "What do you mean?"

Sam pointed at the clipping, "He found the same article we did. Constance Welch, she's a woman in white."

Dean shakes his head and looked over the pictures, "You sly dogs… All right, so if we're dealing with a woman in white, dad would have found the corpse and destroyed it."

Sam countered, "She might have another weakness."

"No, dad would want to make sure, he'd dig her up. Does it say where she's buried?" Dean asked.

Sam shook his head, "No, not that I can tell. If I were dad though, I'd go ask her husband. If he's still alive."

Dean nodded, "All right, why don't you see if you can find an address. I'm gonna get cleaned up."

Sam nodded, and turned to face his older brother, "Hey Dean--What I said earlier, about mom and dad, I'm sorry."

Dean held his hand in front of himself to silence his younger brother, he knew that Sam was sorry. He knew that Sam knew using mom against him was a low blow and most importantly he knew Sam wouldn't be doing it again, "No chick flick moments."

Sam laughed, "All right, jerk."

"Bitch" Dean smiled, _oh yeah, just like old times. _

Dean walked into the bathroom and took a shower. When he walked back out of the bathroom he saw his brother messing with his cell phone, "Hey man, I'm starving. I'm gonna grab a little something to eat at that diner down the street. You want anything?"

"No" was all Sam said.

"Aframian's buying." Dean smiled and walked out of the room. Dean walked towards his car but saw two cops talking to the hotel clerk that had checked them in and shook his head once before pulling out her cell phone and calling his little brother.

"What" Sam asked when he finally answered.

"Dude, five-o take off."

"What about you?"

"Uh, they kind of spotted me. Go find dad" Dean shut his phone, slid it into his pocket and turned to face the cops. He put a big fake smile on his face, "Problem officers."

"Where's your partner?" the cop asked him.

"Partner? What—What partner?" Dean asked in his best innocent voice.

One cop signaled for the other to go check Dean's hotel room, _yeah right, you'll have to try a little harder than that to get Sammy_ Dean thought to himself.

The cop's eyes narrowed, "So. Fake US Marshal, fake credit cards. You got anything that's real?"

Dean's cocky smile did not falter, "my boobs"

The cop shoved him into the back of the cop car, hard, "You have the right to remain silent…" The cop did his speech then pushed him in to the back of the car and drove him to the station. Then put Dean in an interrogation room.

Ten minutes later, here they were.

The cop sighed, "So you want to give us your real name?"

Dean smirked, "I told you, it's Nugent. Ted Nugent."

"I'm not sure you realize just how much trouble you're in here." The cop warned.

"We talking like misdemeanor kind of trouble? Or uh…'squeal like a pig' kind of trouble?" Dean asked mocking seriousness the whole time.

"You got the faces of ten missing persons taped to your wall. Along with a whole lot of satanic mumbo jumbo. Boy, you are officially a suspect."

Dean couldn't help but roll his eyes, "That makes sense. Cause when the first one went missing in '82, I was three."

"I know you got partners; one of them's an older guy. Maybe he started the whole thing. So tell me…Dean." Dean's head shot up and the cop pulled John Winchester's journal out from below the table and dropped it in front of Dean, _Dad NEVER goes ANYWHERE with out that thing_ "Is this his?" Dean says nothing, just stares at his fathers journal "I thought that might be your name. See, I leafed through this, what little I could make out. I mean, it's nine kinds of crazy. But I found this, too." The cop opened to a page that read 'Dean 35-111' "Now, you're staying right here till you tell me exactly what the hell that means." Dean can't tear his eyes away from his father's journal.

"What's it mean?" The cop asked after a long moment had passed.

"Um…" Dean faltered for a moment, "It's my, uh, locker combination…from high school" Dean finally said knowing the explanation was flimsily at best but not being able to come up with anything else quick enough.

Twenty minutes later, here they were.

"I don't know how many times I gotta tell you. It's my high-school locker combo."

"Are we gonna do this all night long?" The cop asked.

Dean was saved of having to answer when the second cop poked his head in, "We just got a 911, shots fired over at Whiteford Road."

The first cop looked at Dean, "Do you have to go to the bathroom?"

Dean was confused, shook his head, "No"

"Good" the cop answered and handcuffed Dean to the table.

The cops leave and Dean looks over at his father's journal. He sees a paper clip poking out and grabs it with a smile, _Just leave me a key why don't you_ he picked the handcuff lock and grabbed the journal. He climbed out of the window in the room and down the fire escape. He ran a few blocks before stopping at a pay phone. He dialed his little brother's number and listened to it ring a few times before he picked up.

"Fake 911 phone call Sammy? I don't know, that's pretty illegal." Dean teased.

"You're welcome."

Dean rolled his eyes and smiled. "Listen, we gotta talk"

"Tell me about it. So the husband was unfaithful, we are dealing with a woman in white. She's buried behind her old house. So that should have been dad's next stop."

Dean rolled his eyes again, "Sammy would you shut up for a second."

Sam ignored him, "I just can't figure out why he hasn't destroyed the corpse yet."

Dean nodded even though Sam couldn't see him, "Well that's what I'm trying to tell you. He's gone. Dad left Jericho"

"What? How do you know?" Sam sounded all most panicked.

"I've got his journal."

Sam's voice had an edge of worry, "He doesn't go anywhere without that."

"Yeah, well he did this time." Dean tried not to let his worry into his voice.

"What's it say?" Sam asked.

Dean shook his head once, "Same old ex-marine crap when he wants to let us know where he's going"

"Coordinates. Where to?" Sam knew. He may have been gone for the last 4 years but he still grew up with them.

"I'm not sure yet" Dean admitted.

"I don't understand, I mean what could be so important that dad would just skip out in the middle of a job? Dean, what the hell is going on? Whoa!" Sam screamed.

Dean panicked, "Sam! Sam!"

Dean ran back to the hotel hoping to be able to track down his little brother. He got a gun from the room and wedged in his belt so it wouldn't be seen. He ran as fast and as hard as he could. He went to the bridge and followed the only road that left from it until he came to a fork in the road; one side looked like the tire tracks were more recent so he went that way.

He finally found what he was looking for. He saw his car, with Sam inside with the woman in white on top of him, _way to go Sammy _he thought before raising his gun and firing, his bullets going right through the woman. It provided the distraction Dean was hoping for and Sam made his move.

Sam turned the engine over and put the car in gear, "I'm taking you home." He said before flooring it and driving straight in to the house... through the wall.

"Sam!" Dean ran into the house, his gun ready, "Sam! You okay?"

"I think"

"Can you move?"

"Yeah. Help me"

Dean helped Sam out of the car and the woman in white pulled a photo of her dead children off the floor. She drops the photo on the floor and throws a dresser with her mind to pin Dean and Sam between it and the Impala. The lights flicker and water starts to leak down the stairs. Constance's children appear at the top of the stairs and join hands, "You've come home to us mommy" they say in unison and Sam and Dean glance at each other before looking back at the scene in front of them.

Suddenly Constance's children are behind her. They reach up and grab her. All three of them liquefy and turn into a sort of puddle on the ground. Sam and Dean finally push the dresser off of them selves and walk over to the puddle on the ground.

"So this is where she drowned her kids." Dean said.

Sam nodded, "That's why she could never go home. She was too scared to face them."

"You found her weak spot. Nice work Sammy." Dean commented.

Sam laughed, "I wish I could say the same for you. What were you thinking shooting Casper in the face, you freak?"

Dean shrugged, "Hey, saved your ass. I'll tell you another thing. If you screwed up my car, I'll kill you." Dean starts to pull wood from the car.

After a few minutes they have the car cleaned up and out of the house. It has a blown out head light but all in all it's all right.

They get in and start down the road. Sam is looking on a map for '35-11'. "Okay here's where dad went. It's called Blackwater Ridge, Colorado."

Dean nodded once, "Sounds charming. How far?"

"About 600 miles." Sam answered.

"If we shag ass we can make it by morning."

Sam looked at his older brother, "Dean, um…"

"You're not going" Sadness lined Dean's voice.

"The interview's in 10 hours, I gotta be there."

Dean nodded, "Yeah. Yeah, whatever. I'll take you home." All he ever really wanted was for Sam to be happy and if this was what made Sam happy…

About an hour later they pulled up in front of Sammy's apartment. Sam got out and grabbed his bag from the back seat. He looked in the passenger side window, "You'll call me if you find him?"

Dean nodded.

Sam tried to smile, "Maybe I can meet up with you later, huh?"

Dean nodded again "Yeah, all right."

Sam started to walk away but Dean's voice stopped him, "Sam" Sam turned around, "You know we made a hell of a team back there"

"Yeah" Sam answered and went inside.

Dean pulled away from the apartment complex. It wasn't fair. He got his little brother back, got to hang out with him, got to be brothers again, as if nothing had changed. But just as fast it had been ripped away. Dean glanced at his watch. Something wasn't right. _Something _didn't feel right to Dean. He turned his car around, back toward Stanford. From the small parking lot he could see flames in Sammy's room.

He ran out of the car and up the stairs. He kicked the door down, "Sam!"

Sam was sitting on his bed, staring up at his girlfriend, pinned there, just as his mother had been all those years ago. "Jess!"

"Sam!" Dean screamed again.

"No. No!" Sam screamed still looking up at her.

Dean grabbed Sam pulling him away, "We gotta get out of here."

"Jess! No!" Sam screamed.

Dean pulled Sam all the way out of the room and out of the building. They were standing in the grass when firemen arrived. A hour and a half later the fire is out and Sam is standing by Dean's car loading a rifle.

Sam and Dean look at each other for a long moment before Sam sighs and nods his head. He throws the loaded rifle in the car, "We got work to do" he states before slamming the door shut.

Dean watched his little brother. He sighed, he wanted his kid brother back but not like this, not because he lost the most important person to him. He didn't say anything just nodded once.

He'd so anything for Sammy.

END

wow, this chapter took forever to come out. sorry about that. i am planning a tag to this fic to be tittled 'you hide' which be the same basic idea only it'll follow Sam though the same time period. i hope you check it out.

And as always, please review!


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